Telephone Reviews

If I would know before ordering that: 1. The receiver has sever echo when you are talking 2.That it gives annoying soundes during dialing 3.That answering machine does not stop when you picking up parallel phone. 4.That automatic dialing is inconvenient I would not buy this phone. But I have it now and will use it.

Overall, a great phone and value! The phone is very sturdy/durable and has almost all the features I was looking for. It also works and looks great! The only feature I was missing was a MUTE button. No big deal though. The only other complaint I have is the power outlet cord comes out fairly easy , and if it does your most likely to get disconnected! Those are the only problems I could find and are not big at all! A great second phone!

I bought two of these phones for my parents (for main phone and a home office phone). The great thing about the phone is that it has a digital VM and Caller ID in one phone. It also can be set to have the VM pick up on the first ring when a telemarketer calls (and blocks their number). The VM is annoying because, like was already mentioned, if the power goes out, your greeting is erased. Two other annoying things, you have to listen to the whole message before erasing it and the VM doesn't shut off when you pick up the handset. I'd buy another one if it meant I didn't have to look for a better one.

Got this machine for free from a yard sale...Works fine but I don't know how to individually erase messages because it didn't come with an operators manual so....I'll try Casios tech # that I got from here unless someone just wants to give me the big ole secret here....otherwise I have to wait for one in the mail....is there a pdf version available?

The inability to repeat messages can be annoying. Erasing messages can be difficult. However, I have had no problems retrieving messages from remote locations -- which was nearly impossible to do with the ancient analog answering machine that this machine replaced. If you're like me, you probably have free voice mail from your cell phone provider, and your friends, relatives & business associates know they can always reach you via email. So, your landline answering machine's primary mission is to discourage &*#@ telemarketers! This machine does the job.

Ok, these "user's review" have their share of dummies, but some of the reviews about this great little answering machine top them all ! Beware: don't believe eveything you read !

This Casio of mine has been working perfectly for 2 years now: electrical burn-outs are no problem: the 9 volt battery takes care of the outgoing message and all of the recorded messages.

You CAN erase each message individually, and skip to the next one, without being forced to listen to is entirety. It does everything it claims in the manual, and you would know that if you'd READ THE MANUAL !

Works great ! Buy it if you cand find one !

I bought this six months ago and finally gave up on it. It would work fine with an old corded phone, but would never disconnect from the modem line (although it would ring to let me know someone was calling) when using three different cordless phones. All I would hear was the modem screeching then then call was disconnected (along with me from my internet connection!). Total frustration! I'm going to try a controller based US Robotics v.92 modem (which claims to do much the same thing, only with caller-id).

If your friends are always complaining about your phone being busy because of your kids tying up the line with the internet (of course, you never do this ;) this just might be the solution for you. This device only works if you have the call waiting option from your phone company. What Catch-a-Call does while you are online, er, I mean while your kids are online, is that it monitors for the call waiting signal. When it senses the beep, it automatically alerts you that a call is coming in by beeping. You now have the option to pick up the phone and answer, or ignor it and continue surfing. The setup is pretty easy. You plug a phone into the back of the unit and to a phone line that is coming from the phone jack in your house/room. Then a line is connected to the back of your computer. Lastly, you will have to find a power outlet in which to power the unit. The rub is that you need to have an extra phone line that is near your computer. If not, you will have to get a long extention cord and a phone jack device that allows another line to come out from the jack. This is what I had to do. I ran a long phone extention cord from the hallway into my home office.

How well does it work? Catch-a-Call claims that you can take a call and then go back to your internet surfing after you hang up. This is sort of true. It definitely does a good job of catching those calls. When ever the Catch a Call beeped, I just pick up the phone and talk to whoever was on there. On some rare occasions, when I picked up the call, I would only here the modem static of my computer instead of the caller. I'm not sure why this happens, but it occured about 1 out of every 20 times. As far as returning to the internet after the call, in theory, when you hang up, you can go back to surfing. This can be done, if you are not on the phone for more than 10 to 15 seconds. After that, when you go back to your surfing, your modem will have disconnected. All you have to do is to hit refresh, and your connection will be reestablished. Be aware that you can only take calls from the phone that is directly connected to the Catch-a-Call and not from any other phones in the house. Catch-a-Call can prevent you from losing all those phone calls while you are online. However, some of the trouble, if at all, in using it will depend on how your house/apartment is setup for phone lines and the price that you pay for the unit. If you buy it for retail, you have probably not gotten yourself a very good deal. Try shopping around as this unit is also sold at some of the electronic mega stores at much better prices than Radio Shack.

I've seen reviews that bash this product, but it's been great for me. Now we don't have to worry about missing a call from one of our kids when we're on line.

The necessary steps are (1)get call-waiting from your phone company, (2) hook up the product so the phone line goes from your wall to the device, to your computer and phone, (3) make sure your PC's "internet connections" are not set to disable call waiting. That's it. Then when you're on line, the device rings when a call comes in. Simple as that.

Ad mis-leading. Shows handset with dial-pad. Unit has label on it saying "this is NOT a handset" ! Do not recommend this phone....

I love the phone but I have to stop you. The recently released CT-10 (one model up) is so superior that you should at least consider it. It about $40 more but the improvements are vast. This is a good inexpensive alternative and none of the competitve models compare. However, the CT-10 has much better battery life (5+hrs), a much smaller hand set (smaller than a deck of cards), a holder for the headset on the base, a clip for the cord (otherwise the jack wears out overtime for the movement), and a gradiated volume control (not just loud/soft). I think it is worth the upgrade if you will be using this regularly.

After tons of surfing for cordless headsets, my husband bought me this for Christmas. I love it! I'm not extremely knowledgeable in cordless headset BRANDS, but I can tell you this is the coolest thing ever! For the 1st time, I do not get a kink in my neck or a sore ear after being on the phone while trying to do dishes, laundry or even surfing on the net! The dialpack is tiny, practically weightless and I hardly notice it. The head set is adjustable and very comfy! So far on both ends the sound has been crystal clear! If you don't mind having 2 phones, and are looking for a inexpensive way to get a cordless head set...I would definately recomend this one! The only problem is that my husband loves it too! Guess what he is getting for his birthday? hahaha

I've read some reviews that criticize this phone. Don't know what they did to it (dropped it too many times?). We recieved this phone as a holiday gift and have been pleasantly surprized. I typically have little faith in GE small appliances and electronics, but, since it was a gift, was forced to try it. No problems to report. Fair battery life, never a signal failure, locator works great, looks good on our office desk. Can't beat the price. If it's got what you want, buy it!

I have had this phone now almost 8months and it has been great!!! I am so glad that I found it. No static, it has a clear reception and I can walk all around my big backyard and talk without interuption.

THIS IS A REAL NICE PHONE TO HAVE IT GOES KIND OF FAR AND IT HAS TWO RING TONES THE ONLY THING BAD ABOUT THIS PHONE IS THAT IT DONT HAVE CALLER ID AND SOME TIME YOU GET SOME NOICE IN THE PHONE AND THE VOL IS REAL LOW AND YOU CAN HEAR YOUR SELF... BUT IT IS A NICE PHONE FOR THE PRICE....

(...)Here are my comments:
The Good:
1. The color is very vivid compared to the 3-year old Creative webcam I had before.
2. Can be cliped on the laptop. The clipping mechnisim is very simple, and it worked for my laptop (a Dell Inspiron).

The bad:
1. Since the base of the camera also serves as the clip, it's very very light (just two piece of plastic), so sometimes it has trouble staying put.
2. On Windows XP, I had trouble with the control application that comes with the webcam (the application that let you take snap shots, take the video, etc). Upon exit of the application, the program crashes. However, I didn't experience any problem with the driver, so the cam works fine with Yahoo and MSN messenger on XP. I don't know if this has anything to do with an earlier version of the Creative application (for my old webcam). I ended up uninstall the old program but haven't had the chance to re-install the new one yet. So I don't know if this problem will go away. I checked Creative's website, there is no software patch available. I didn't have this problem with Win 2000.
3. Had a minor problem when used on my Win2000 machine which has a 4 port D-Link USB hub. When attached to one of the port, it complained serveral times about not enough bus bandwidth. I switched to a different port and the problem seemed go away.
4. Performance under low light condition is somewhat below my expectation.

In general, this is a so-so camera. Not as good as advertised, but then what do you expect from 59 or 79 dollars?

I recently purchased a WebCam Pro eX. It's the first web cam I've ever used or owned. I don't know of any others since I haven't used them. Some observations:

Pro: Good picture quality in adequatly lit conditions. CCD sensor. People on the other side of the ocean have told me that this web cam gives has good picture quality, but needs proper lighting source. Good Color quality. User can adjust brightness, saturation and contrast levels in accordance to the time of day. Software provided is easy to use. Comes with a microphone. Has a wide choice of resolutions - up to 1024 x 768. Works extremely well with Windows 2000. I don't use Windows XP, nor do I have any desire to upgrade to it, due to hardware compatibility problems this operating system has, and problems in general. If people have problems with this webcam using XP, it isn't because Creative produces poor drivers or a bad product, it's just that XP (Home or Pro) isn't a very good operating system. It's a poor O/S overall and I've had nothing but problems using it.

Cons: No digital zoom. It's difficult to save compressed Windows Media Player files with low frames rates without encountering problems with video and voice synchronization. Perhaps someone can tell me how to correct this problem. Picture quality degrades under poorly lit conditions. Camera requires a secondary light source. Micorphone is so-so. I use another headset instead.

This small baby is my fifth webcam.

Easy to install in Windows XP. I do not follow the instruction on the manual. Plugin the webcam first, XP reports there is a new device, insert CD-ROM. Do not follow the autoplay of CD-ROM, let XP search the driver, and it's done, 2 minutes is enough.
If u still want to install other software, insert cd-rom again, but unchecked the driver option, and u will install the left.

The picture is clear and sharp, color saturation is good, very stable to stay on my laptop LCDs. Creative has a good product.

It's far better than Logitech Quick Cam Express, and Intel cheapset one. For my point of view, picture quality is better than logitech Pro 4000, which is the comparable product of this one.

Here is some cons: no lens cover, the picture not as good as the Intel pccam Pro, which is the best one i ever use.

This phone has terrific features such as dual keypad on base and handset, speakerphone on base and handset, and most impressively caller ID windows on both the base and handset. However, the quality is very poor and it has some design flaws. The range is horrible - I was unable to walk outside without the phone cutting out for two or three seconds, and I could not walk to my mailbox without losing my call. Also, the phone does not rest well on its cradle which makes it nearly impossible to mount on the wall bracket. My first 1932 had to be returned within a week because it fell off of it's wall mount and the antenna broke (the antenna was in the down position and it still broke). All in all I was very dissapointed with this phone and with V-Tech customer service. I ordered this phone directly from V-Tech's web site and had many, many problems working with them. The great features aren't worth the faults of this phone.

I've had this phone for a couple of months and am very pleased with its overall performance. It's tough to beat the performance and features, for the price.

The handset reception is clear, even through 4 walls with metal frames (I don't even have to extend the antenna). The speaker phone feature is very good although the handset speaker phone seems to provide somewhat less quality than the base unit but still quite acceptable. There is ample memory for number storage. Programmimg the phone and accessing the features is uncomplicated and straight-forward.

Really, my only beef is the handset cradle. Its design does not hold the handset securely enough and if you're not careful about setting the handset in the cradle or if the wall, on which the phone is mounted, is substantially jarred, the handset can fall out. It's happened to me, 3 times - and onto a tile floor! However, the good news is that only minor damage has resulted - nothing a little crazy glue couldn't handle. The phone is still operating perfectly - a telling attribute of its durability.

Without hesitation, I would recommend this product.

I have had this phone for nine months and have had no problems to date. The range is good. The speakerphone is also excellent. My only problem is that it would have been nice if the phone had a clock on its display. Other than that it works excellent.

My wife and I are separated and we thought the Beamer would be the perfect choice to bridge our distance. No way! The video at best, is so pixelated and time lagged that the little tiny screen barely shows who or what you're looking at. Never has it been in "real time" and it's no better then the first web cams that came out on the internet six years ago. I've done my diagnostics and it's the Beamer, not my phone line or connection.
It's not a video phone; it's a waste of time, waste of money, waste of extra phone call charges from when it "connects", and most of all, a great dissapointment for two people who are apart.

I bought two units of the beamer and sent one to my family. Turn out one unit is defective - something wrong with the camera. If I send it back to Vialta for repair, they charge me close to $100 + shipping. I think this is a ridiculous amount, as it is almost enough to get a new one.

My daughter lives 3000 miles away, and when she gave birth to my first grandchild earlier this year it saddened me that I wouldn't be able to see my granddaughter as often as I would like to. Now with Beamer, I get to see her eating her Cheerios, waving hello and even saw her dressed in her new, adorable Christmas outfit.

I'm not real comfortable with electronics stuff, so I was really happy that Beamer was very easy to set up and use. All I do is pick up the phone and call my daughter, so there was really nothing new to learn. I also like the fact that I didn't have to buy a new phone, or pay anything extra for my phone calls.

While the Beamer video is definitely not DVD or TV picture quality, I still get to see my granddaughter smile anytime I want to, and she gets to see me. Since she's still too young to be talking, it makes me feel a whole lot better that I can see her on the phone and start a relationship with her from so far away. Beamer isn't quite the Jetsons cartoons, which my kids watched while they were growing up, but it sure has changed my life.

I gave Beamer 5 stars because it does what it promised. It was easy to set up and use, the picture is good (not great), and most importantly, it helps me stay connected to the rest of my family.

Not a horrible phone, but not the best quality either. My two-year old broke the antenna off the portable within two weeks (our two other portables have not had this problem). We glued it back on and it still works. The speaker phone occasionally cuts out while on hold--no apparent problems while using it to talk. Sound quality is fine and no problems using the unit throughout the house (including upstairs with the base downstairs).

This is a really good deal - the convenience of a cordless handset and the clarity of a corded one, for a low low price. Add to that caller-id and answering machine, and you're looking at a phone that cannot be beat.

I've owned it for over a month and have had absolutely no problems mentioned by the 1-star reviews. The message waiting light is not feeble, the voice is clear and LCD display works perfectly.

Pros:
Aesthetically pleasing
Very convenient
Priced to sell
Only one phone jack needed
Loud speakerphone
You can keep base and handset in different rooms

Cons:
Requires two power outlets (one each for base and handset charger)

The 26958 met all the criteria I was looking for in a phone. It's well designed and sturdily built. Programming is simple and straightforward, even without refering to the manual. This feature was especially important to me, since I purchased the phone for someone who is technologically challenged.

It has all the features you would want in a phone: cordless phone, digital answering machine, caller ID, and speakerphone. The combination of a corded base unit and separate cordless gives you an additional extension. More importantly, if there is a power failure or the battery dies, you still have a phone.

The handset is larger and heavier than many of the cordless units available, but it doesn't seem to be a problem. The handset display is easier to read than many cordless phones, and it lights up when the phone is in use.

Nice features, but recorded messages are almost unintelligible, and the sound level of the handset is too low. You can increase the volume, but then it reverts to the low level volume for the next call. I'm now looking for a new phone because I'm tired of playing messages 5 times trying to understand them. A friend of mine has a Uniden and he has the same complaints.

OK, so this is true about the 9800. This model looks similar, but you would have to take it apart to see if there is also a Lucent DSP in the answering machine part of the 9980. I agree that our speech coder quality is sub par. I have owned a few Uniden phones that used our DSP, and I do not like the quality of the recording - you have to play it several times for some calls, and sometimes you still can't make everything out. I don't know if other companies made a better answering machine DSP, but I would rather use an old tape machine. The 900MHz part works very well - I have had no problem. I HAVE had the same experience as others here - this handset design has a Talk button that is very easy to hit with your ear while talking - others in my family were so frustrated with this feature that they stopped using the phone. Since I had a small part in the history of the phone, I continue to use it. The division I worked for disbanded a few years ago, so no more or our answering machine DSPs will be produced (thankfully).

I own four uniden cordless phones, three of them are 900 mhz. and one is a 2.4 model. You can hardly own a better phone. I never hear any interference, I never have one problem with clarity in either the answering machine or the handset, it never drops calls, or loses volume during use. And I mean any of them. I have the EXS 9800, the EXT. 1965, the EXS 9980, and the TRU 2.4. As it is with all cordless phones you do have to push "talk" to use it, if it is off the base, but in answering it when it rings it does have an "auto-talk" feature which allows you to merely pick it up and begin talking and all of that is clearly explained in the manual, as are all the phone's other features. Not liking to push "talk" before using it is like not liking to start your car before driving it. Come on, we have to put some effort into it. I can recommend using the headset with it, it is a great feature that eliminates neck strain tremendously. I use all of these phones in my business and I spend anywhere from 4 to 6 hrs. a day on the phone. One thing you have to have is a decent phone service, we have Bellsouth in our area, and they provide great phone service, so don't blame an inferior service or bad home wiring on the phone if you hear either static or interference. I live in an area where there is so much radio activity until my son's remote car will just take off across the floor without anyone controlling it, yet this activity never causes problems with any of my Uniden phones,never!! I am construction contractor and I use my EXS 9800 on one of my construction sights without a hitch,--ever!! These phones have an intercom feature which is great for contacting others at the base location and again the sound and clarity is perfect. My sister has an EXS 9800 that she dropped in a sink full of water, but after drying it thoroughly it worked as good as ever! I say if you have a problem with a Uniden phone start checking everything else besides the phone, even yourself!